Hand for Podcast $5-10NL

This hand comes from a session I played at $5-10NL, uncapped at the Bike last night. Villain in the hand is a young guy but he is very bad. Lost a bunch of his 2K stack earlier on then got super lucky when he opened with 4d 8d UTG and got it all in on a flop of 442 when it was pretty obvious that he was beat given the action. He bet flop got called in several spots, then the BB, a very snug guy, check raised him, he 3 bet and then snap called off a massive 4 bet overpot size shove. He was against 22 and hit an 8 on the turn.

Effective stacks $3000.

Villain opens UTG to $35, big donk in CO calls, I raise to $135 with As Qd on the button. Villain calls, donk folds. Pot $315

FLOP: 9s 9h 4d. He checks, I cbet to $165, he takes a long time, stares at me and raises to $425. I'm not one to rely heavily on live reads but I thought there was a very good chance that I still had the best hand. Something about his mannerisms made me think he was totally full of shit. I called. Pot $1165

I fucking HATE getting raised or check/raised on super dry flops by bad players when I also don't have much. They're not tricky enough to do it with trips or a full house, but you also can't rep anything if you raise them back.

When it gets to the river, I don't think there's much value in betting, so I would check back. But a value fiend like Bart Hanson might be tempted to bet anyway. I would check it back because when guys check quickly, it's either because they have nothing and are giving up or rivered a monster and are checking to look weak so that you bet and they could C/R. Or they have a decent hand but are going to snap you off instead of betting because they're afraid of getting raised. Medium strength hands that you would be trying to get value from by betting (like QQ or TT) would at least think about it before they check.

He might have actually run into a hand on the turn if he bet small (like if he decided to C/R you with AK). And by the river, you also lose to AJ and JJ.

On second thought, maybe he had an A with a bad kicker that he was bad enough to call a 3bet OOP with, which his small bet on the turn might be indicative of. But he still had no plans to fold the river, hence the quick check, so maybe you can get value from a weak A. That's why you win more than I do, because in practice, I would probably take a showdown in a 3bet pot.

I can't imagine him having 99 played this way. Too strong on the flop, too weak on the river.

44, JJ, AJ, AK, AQ - somehow putting you on AA all of a sudden and deciding to pot-control the river "just in case". Probably unlikely - I'd expect 44/JJ to keep firing.

9x - Maybe he learned his lesson from before and decided not to "overplay it" this time. Still, I'd expect him to keep firing w/ 9x. Unlikely holding.

A4s - the only Ax hand I can think of that would play this way. He flopped bottom pair and decided to turn it into a bluff. Then tried to get value against your "overpair" because most people don't float in a 3-bet pot vs a check/raise w/ AQ. Thing is, there's only like 1 combo of A4s.

Some other weirdly played pocket pair (22, 55-88, TT, QQ, KK) - I'd think that if he somehow had KK or QQ, these are the only hands that are paying you on the river.

I think he's more likely to have a weirdly played pocket pair. Maybe bet really small, like $400 if you want super-thin-value. If he suddenly check-raises you'll probably have to give him credit and fold.

Bet fold like $450 to get called by weaker aces. His line is really weird, c/r, lead, check, but then, he seems to be a bit of a spot. I think you might value-own yourself sometimes here, but that's the life of a value fiend.

it seems like his range consists of a lot of pocket pairs that: check/raised flop to "see where he's at", stabbed the turn "trying to rep the Ace", then quickly checked hoping to check down his two pair with an Ace. i don't think you can get a call from 88 / TT type hand, but you said he was really bad, so maybe he bluff catches with those even though there is almost literally no hand you could have that doesn't beat 88/TT, except a light three-bet [who floated the flop c/r??].

he also might have some weaker aces in his range that bet small on the turn cuz he thought he got lucky by moving ahead of your "pocket pair".

there is certainly a chance that he holds AK and is inducing/pot controlling the river, but i think you can go for thin value with about $475 to get hero called by a pocket pair and/or value called by a weaker Ace. there is almost no chance he c/r a worse value hand or a bluff for that much money on the river in a 3bet pot, when hero has shown a lot of strength throughout.

This guy is never slowing down w a nine or fh clearly. His flop cr is either a total airball or an overpair TT/QQ/KK. His smallish bet on turn relative to his flop bet looks like an overpair afraid of the A (goes against your read). He may have also hit an A or a J with some of his airballs. Basically AQ beats everything he has. I'm betting 475 on this river which may get a crying call from his made hands. Another option is to bet 50 to induce.

Villain opens UTG to $35, big donk in CO calls, I raise to $135 with As Qd on the button. Villain calls, donk folds. Pot $315

FLOP: 9s 9h 4d. He checks, I cbet to $165, he takes a long time, stares at me and raises to $425. I'm not one to rely heavily on live reads but I thought there was a very good chance that I still had the best hand. Something about his mannerisms made me think he was totally full of shit. I called. Pot $1165

Did you consider checking back flop to let him spew OTT? If he picks up an underpair OTT he's setting his sights on SD, so your money is only going in good.

The nice thing about guys like this is that they don't bluff small and are easy to induce.I think he's leading with any 9x,77+,44 at least 50% of the time, c/c with 66- and 4x, and c/r mostly air and high-card-type hands.I'd be wary of BDFDs, K6hh is totally in his range here.

If he doesn't lead w/ 9x,44 his c/r would have been bigger since your hand looks a lot like TT+,AK and he assumes TT+ is calling a large raise and AK is folding no matter what.

Turn As. He bets $330, I call.

He hit a weak A and wants you to spazz with TT-KK or whatever. Should probably click it back or a tiny bit more; he's not folding for 500 more.

River Jd. He quickly checks. What's your play?

This is a lot of chop Axs that find themselves kickerless. I expect him to think we will be betting trying to bluff him off a chop A.

He will probably c/r these if we bet a b/f-y amount (ie if I bet <AI I am not folding to a raise), but I like a shove to make it look the most bluffy. In the case that we had raised OTT the shove becomes trivial.Really, the only hand he plays this way most of the time that beats us is AJ.AK would have 4-bet pre a lot of the time would have led a lot larger OTT--I probably include .5 of the 8 remaining AK combos.

This guy is never slowing down w a nine or fh clearly. His flop cr is either a total airball or an overpair TT/QQ/KK. His smallish bet on turn relative to his flop bet looks like an overpair afraid of the A (goes against your read). He may have also hit an A or a J with some of his airballs. Basically AQ beats everything he has. I'm betting 475 on this river which may get a crying call from his made hands. Another option is to bet 50 to induce.

The only OPs I can really include OTF are TT-JJ. He's 4-betting QQ+ at basically 100%.

That action can't be quite right. You have the As in your hand and on the turn. Does it matter? Was it really the Ad so the flush comes in on the river?

I tried posting earlier that it looked like a pair to me like TT or JJ.. then when he bets smaller on the turn then the flop that feels like a pair under the Ace.. So when he checks the river I would bet really small .. why not just match his turn bet 330 and if he raises I think he backed into Jacks full.

My first reaction is to bet/fold but after thinking about it, I think i am bet/calling river. I dont think the villain has trips or better and I dont think he is going to check raise the river with AJ. I believe that when villain checkraises the flop he is polarized between having a nine or air and based on the river check I think he has air. So if he raises my river bet, what would usually be a bet/fold I think is now a bet/bluff-catch. I think villain can have any pocket pair except 99,44,AA; alot of Ax, and alot of air.

Sizing i am not sure. Probably $250 only because I think smaller bets(relative to pot) are more likely to induce so he'd have more bluffs in his range to make up for the times he has jacks full.

This line screams medium pocket pair. While it is not tough for him to have a 9 here (given that he opened 84s in the example hand), in the previous example he bet out as opposed to check raising. Also, he called the 3B, so that should tighten his range up a bit. He may be mixing it up, but from what I have seen, non-thinking players generally take rote lines throughout their session, so I would heavily discount 9x here unless its A9s.

The second piece of interesting information comes when he only bets $330 on the turn. What type of hand makes a pot sized check raise on the flop and then leads for a 1/4 pot sized bet on the turn? 44 and 99 are making a much more substantial bet IMO (and quads is never c/raising the flop). To me, this is the effective nuts (AA/A9) or a hand like 55-JJ (excluding 99 obviously). AA can be discounted (?) because most people would 4B that hand, so that leaves A9 and medium pairs.

If Villian is terrible as described, I wouldn't put it past him to check the river hoping for a check raise (can't tell you how many people I've played against have had something like "awww man! you should be betting there!" come out of their when I check back on a board where its obvious that they have a nutty hand), but that doesn't fit with the small turn sizing.

Once we get to the river, we have $1825 in the pot and ~2100 in our stack. I would bet something like ~750 and fold to a ship. We'd be giving villain 3.5/1 on his money and there would be plenty of hands that will call that are worse than ours.

Do you have any sense how the villain feels about money? By that I mean is there any chance he is the type that goes silly early in a session but then protects his stack when it gets bigger - or does the money mean nothing to him? If he is one of those that might be trying to protect the stack he luckboxed- then I can see check or bet fold. If he does not care about money then I can buy the bet call line. Knowing nothing - hmm - bet real small to get some value from a worse pair and fold to raise.

@wackabrew- what part of his range are you trying to get river value from with a $750 bet? That is seen as a really big bet in 5/10nl live and there is very little chance he is calling with an unimproved pocket pair. Maybe he can start thinking about calling with Ax, but that is a small part of his range. Though the pot is big, villian will have a tough time calling $750 with a hand worse than AQ.

I bet $600 and he called rather quickly and I was good. However, I think my sizing was a mistake. I think that this is either a check back or an absolute bomb on the river--like $1200 to get him to call with his Ax hands. More about this on the show tomorrow. This guy was BAD.

I bet $600 and he called rather quickly and I was good. However, I think my sizing was a mistake. I think that this is either a check back or an absolute bomb on the river--like $1200 to get him to call with his Ax hands. More about this on the show tomorrow. This guy was BAD.

Bart

Bart

Did you bet bigger because he was a calling station? Normally against the average player you always talk about betting smaller in this spot to get hero looked up. Did you think he had an Ace? Just curious if the bigger bet was due to Donk factor?

Sorry for being a pest.. but you always say that this size bet will look Big.. even though its about third pot..

Just as a general guide.. when does a bet look really big even though the donk is probably not keeping track of the pot.. oh and I assume you are putting lots of 100 dollar chips in there to make it easier..